*Olivia*
I woke up and imdiately panicked. I couldn’t see anything, and I wasn’t in my soft bed snuggled up next to Gio. Where the fuck was I? I blinked hard, trying to see in the darkness, but realized there was sothing over my head, covering up my vision.
I turned my head from side to side, trying to get any sense of what was going on, and realized it was a black bag over my head. I tried to pull my hands up to my eyes, but my wrists were being held together tightly behind my back; it felt like it was zip ties based on how they were digging into my skin. My feet were tied to the legs of the chair that I was sitting on, and the hard tal dug into my ankles.
Even though I knew it was pointless, I kept trying to pull my wrists free. My hands were going numb from my efforts, but everything in fought against being tied down like this. I didn’t know what was going on, but I knew enough to know that I was in terrible danger. People don’t tie you up unless they plan on doing horrible things to you.
A man’s deep laugh burst into the quiet from my right, and I imdiately went still. It hadn’t occurred to that soone might be watching my struggle. How had he managed to get here? Where the fuck was Gio? My blood went cold when I realized that if I was here, it must an that they had Giovani. There was no way he would have let them take from our bed without a fight.
Oh god... what if he was horribly injured, and they had him tied up just like ? He could be right next to in this very room for all I knew. I wanted to scream out his na, but I stayed silent. I couldn’t let my captors know what I was thinking. I didn’t know what they wanted, but it would be dangerous to give them even the tiniest bit of information.
“Good morning, printsessa,” a man with a thick Russian accent said.
The words sent a shiver down my spine, but I forced myself not visibly to react to his voice. He didn’t need to know that I was scared out of my mind. I sat up as straight as my bindings would allow, determined to look confident, even if I felt anything but. I tried to channel Dahlia. She knew how to be a badass in any situation.
“How did you sleep?” he murmured sowhere by my ear.
He knew I had no way of knowing exactly where he was in the room, and he intended his sudden closeness to be disarming, to put on edge. It did, but he didn’t need to know that. The benefit of the bag over my head was that he couldn’t see my facial expressions and know exactly how terrified I was.
I stayed silent. I wouldn’t let him goad into a reaction, no matter what. I was strong. I couldn’t see him, but I could hear his soft footsteps as he slowly circled . The hair on the back of my neck prickled as I got the distinct feeling that I was being stalked by a predator. If he was a spider, I was the innocent fly caught in his web.
But if there was one thing I knew about spider webs, it was that the more the fly struggled, the less likely they were to ever escape. Struggle is what drew the spider’s imdiate attention, and I got the distinct feeling that this particular spider was highly trained to note even the most minute of struggles. My reactions would determine the type of questioning that he threw at . If I could just manage to sit here, emotionless and unreactive, I might be able to waste his ti long enough that Giovani would sohow get us free.
I felt a surprisingly soft hand lay gently over the back of my neck. I couldn’t stop myself from jumping and trying to pull away. I was revolted by his touch. His fingers tightened just enough to keep from being able to move, but not enough to hurt. The ssage was clear–he wasn’t going to hurt ... yet.
I forced myself to relax. I just had to remain calm no matter what happened. I could do this.
His hand slid from my neck to my left shoulder and he placed his other hand on my right shoulder. I could feel him leaning down so that he lood over . I forced myself not to shrink away. He pressed his face close to my left side and said softly, “Let’s make this easy on both of us. You’re going to tell everything you know about Giovani, and we won’t even need to think about what happens if you don’t.”
He squeezed my shoulders slightly, not enough to hurt, just enough to show how easy it would be for him to hurt . I wondered why he wanted to hear about Gio. Surely, they had gotten Gio as well? Or maybe they hadn’t. Maybe they had sohow managed to sneak in and only take . His words filled with hope. If they only had , that ant Giovani knew I was missing and was doing everything he could to get back. He would never let be in danger for long.
“You’re a good girl, aren’t you? I’ve heard so many things about what a good, smart girl you are. Aspiring scientist, isn’t that right?”
I shuddered at the implications of what he said. Soone had been watching closely and reporting back to him if he knew about how much I liked biology. It was probably the sa person who had left that horrible note in my notebook. What if it was soone in the class with ?
In spite of my determination to be brave, tears began to leak from my eyes. For the first ti, it occurred to that I could die here, tied to this fucking chair. And there was nothing that Gio or anybody could do about it. It didn’t matter how badly he wanted to keep safe or how hard he worked to get back. Sohow I had been taken, and now Giovani was nowhere to be found. And if he didn’t get to soon, it would be too late.
“So, tell , are you going to be a good girl for ?”
His voice sickened with how patronizing and damn near lascivious he sounded. I wanted his fucking hands off of my shoulders, but I didn’t dare try to move away. Sohow, I managed to find enough bravery to respond.
“No,” I choked out, hoping he couldn’t hear the fact that I was crying in my voice.
He dug his fingernails into my shoulders, and I whimpered involuntarily.
“I’m going to rip that bag off your head so I can look you in the eyes while I smack so answers out of you,” he said in a voice that was shaky with rage.
I gave up on my brave act, tears fully streaming down my face as I clenched my entire body so tightly I was afraid I would pass out. I’d never been hit by a man before, and I really didn’t want to start now. I felt him stalk around my side and roughly grab the sides of the black bag by my neck. He yanked it over my head and I scread.
***
I woke up, a scream dying in my throat as I realized I was in bed, and Gio was sleeping safely beside . Holy shit, that had been the most realistic dream I’d ever had. I reached up and touched my shoulder with one hand, feeling where I had thought fingernails were being dug in. There were little half-crescents of pain there, and I realized I must have done it to myself. I touched my face and realized I was actually crying. Feeling my tears and recalling my fear sent a fresh wave of raw emotion through , and I broke down all over again, trying to suck in air as my body was wracked with deep, heaving sobs.
My cries woke Gio. He imdiately sat up and gathered to his chest.
“What’s wrong?” he asked quietly, stroking my back and hair in comforting circles.
“I–” I stopped, the dream on the tip of my tongue. As badly as I wanted to tell him what my psyche had managed to terrify with, I also didn’t want to give him yet another reminder that being with him was actively putting in danger.
“It’s nothing,” I lied. “I just woke up for so reason.”
He leaned over to kiss my forehead. I could see in his eyes that he didn’t believe , but he didn’t push for more information. After a few monts, he laid back down, bringing with him. His comforting touch helped to soothe my racing heart, but I was terrified to fall back asleep.
I knew he must be exhausted–I could see it in the circles under his eyes–but he stayed awake and continued rubbing my back and hair until finally my breathing was fully back to normal, and the tears had stopped trailing from my eyes.
“Are you okay, baby?” he murmured.
“Yeah, I’m about to fall back to sleep,” I lied to him again. I had no interest in going back to sleep yet.
“Alright. Just know that I’m here, okay? I’ll always be here.” He dropped a kiss on the top of my head.
“I love you,” I whispered into the darkness.
“I love you so much,” he whispered back, his arms tightening around in a gentle squeeze.
Before long, he had fallen back to sleep, and the room was filled with the sounds of his even breathing. I lay on Gio’s chest, just listening to his soft snores and appreciating the strong beat of his heart.
I stared into the darkness for at least an hour, not wanting to wake Gio again but not wanting to fall back asleep myself. I knew that he would tell to just wake him up, but I had seen how tired he was. If only one of us was going to be able to get any sleep tonight, I wanted it to be him.
I turned my nightmare over and over in my mind. It had felt so real, even down to the Russian voice. No matter how much I reminded myself that it had just been a dream, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had really been there in that chair, alone and in genuine danger.
Finally, I was able to fall back into a restless sleep. After what felt like only a few minutes, our alarm blared and pulled us both awake. I groaned.
I had a feeling that it was going to be a terrible day.
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